High mileage 7th gen. GTS? - Toyota Nation Forum : Toyota Car and Truck Forums

psifunction · 09-27-2009, 11:39 PM

Hi everyone,

I'm new to this forum and a potential new Celica owner. Although my MK3 Supra has provided me years of faithful service, it has now become a project car and I have to tear apart (or replace) the engine, so I'm in the market for a nice daily driver. What's gotten my attention is the 7th gen. GTS. The 180hp sounds appealing because I wouldn't be tempted to mod it. It appeals more to me than a GT because there's too many idiot drivers here in Southern California and you just never know when those extra horses might come in handy.

I found a 2000 GTS 6spd w/ 193k miles for $4700. I did the math and it comes out to about 75 miles per day, which is a lot (my '88 Supra has 127k!). My question is, is there any 7th gen. GT/GTS owners with lots of miles on theirs who can give me feedback? I'm going to check the car out and ask for service records, but I wonder if there's any issues with these cars at high mileage (for instance, my Supra headgasket went out at 125k miles, inevitably). I don't really want to buy an extended warranty but I also don't want to take a big risk if there is no servicing records. I know what Toyotas are capable of; I had an '82 Celica Supra that died at 345k miles. I just wonder if this generation of Celicas have the same potential. I estimate I'll (at least for the next 3 or 4 years) be putting on about 9k miles per year, and I'm hoping to not have to do major maintenance nor buy another car for about 6 years.

Input appreciated. Thanks!

psifunction · 10-07-2009, 10:47 PM

anyone?

Pwner Guy · 10-10-2009, 06:02 PM

Well I can't really say too much about the GTS as I don't see a lot come to the shop, mostly GT's. But the few I have dealt with had high kilometers. One that particularily stands out had 285,000 KM on the clock and was running quite fine. I'm not sure what the conversion to Miles would be but I think its in the area your looking at. From the kind of mileage it has it seems like a commuter car so it's likely mostly highway, which should last you. I know that the GT's are good reliable cars, I see one come in for basic maintence items, brakes and the last time it was in an O2 sensor. It had 275,000 KM. So if you can get service records or at least even just ask the owner whether it was mainly city or highway driving.

Also on an unrelated note the 7M in the MKIII Supra is notorious for blowing the head gasket, from factory the torque specs were too low. So a common fix is to replace the stock gasket with a metal one or a bit of a backyard fix is to add 10 ft/lbs to the torque specs when replacing the gasket with an OEM part.

psifunction · 10-13-2009, 10:31 PM

Thanks for your reply. 193k miles is about 310,600km. If these cars are relatively low maintenance I'm going to seriously consider buying it. There's so many older generation Celicas out there with many more miles still going strong. I only hope the 7th generation is even better!

And yes, retorquing the head on the Supra after replacing the headgasket with an OEM is precisely what I did.

celicastorm · 10-15-2009, 06:35 PM

My 2000 GT-S has 132,000 miles and I've never had any engine problem at all.

It's the best combination of auto performance and fuel economy I've ever owned.

ae_101 · 11-01-2009, 04:22 PM

the wife as an 04 gt. 117,xxx miles. not a problem with it. Take it every where and alot of road trips too! Great car. Miles dont scare me with toyotas.